6-Day Gettysburg to Washington DC Historic Journey Bike Tour

Please meet at the Watergate Hotel at 9am. If you plan to drive to the tour you can leave your car at the hotel parking garage until you arrive back there on Friday. If you are arriving by air for the tour, it’s easiest if you fly into Ronald Reagan National Airport and take a short taxi ride to the hotel. Specific details, directions, and information on parking fees will be provided in your Confirmation Tour Details Packet. Our guides meet you in the main lobby of the hotel at 9:00 AM for a 9:30 AM transfer to Gettysburg. On Sunday afternoon, you enjoy a pleasant, easy warm-up ride as well as a visit to the Gettysburg National Park Service Museum and Visitor Center where you get a primer on the Civil War through short videos, photographs, and artifacts like Robert E. Lee’s battlefield cot and desk. The famous Gettysburg Cyclorama is also here, a monumental 1884 painting by the French artist Paul Phillipteaux that depicts Pickett’s Charge. Dinner is at the historic Dobbins Tavern, where you feel like you have stepped directly back into the 1860s. You are guests tonight at the Brick House Inn, a historic bed and breakfast located within easy walking distance of downtown Gettysburg.
Accommodation: Brick House Inn
Meals: Lunch, Dinner

Biking: 10 miles (16 kilometres)
Terrain: Easier

The day begins with a delicious breakfast on the patio of the inn. Then you will be offered a fascinating four-hour professionally guided bike ride through the major sites of Gettysburg battlefield. As a refresher, in the early summer of 1863, Confederate General Robert E. Lee began an ambitious invasion of the north. Then, on July 1, Confederate and Union troops collided on the grassy hills of Gettysburg, thrusting this sleepy town of 2,400 into the Civil War. The three-day battle was the war’s turning point and resulted in staggering losses – an estimated 51,000 casualties in all. It was the Civil War’s bloodiest battle and inspired President Abraham Lincoln to come to Gettysburg on November 19, 1863 to deliver “a few appropriate remarks” – the Gettysburg Address.

Our guided tour takes us along acres of woodlands, farmlands, craggy ridges and sloping valleys all now part of the Gettysburg National Military Park. The tour includes many stops along the way to explore such iconic sites as McPherson Ridge, Little Round Top, and to perhaps linger a bit longer at the field called the “High Water Mark”, where some 12,000 Confederate infantrymen crossed in a mile-long front known as Pickett’s Charge. Later in the afternoon you have the option for a longer ride that will take you to the 100-foot-long Sachs Covered Bridge. You might also take the opportunity to explore Gettysburg’s compact but lively center, lined with Federal-style buildings and filled with mom-and-pop shops, restaurants, tourism establishments, and a number of historic houses open to the public.

You are on your own tonight for dinner in Gettysburg
Accommodation: Brick House Inn
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch

Biking: 10 or 26 miles (16 or 42 kilometres)
Terrain: Easier to Intermediate

This is one of those perfect biking days! After a transfer over the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, we cycle south through 36 miles of peaceful, traffic-free farm roads and narrow lanes enjoying some of the most spectacular rural views of rolling farmland, green pastures, hayfields and intermittent small hamlets. This bucolic ride takes you into Maryland and ends on a tree-lined seldom used gravel road that brings you into the northeast corner of the Antietam National Historic District. Following a picnic lunch, a biking member of the National Park Service will lead us on a narrated tour through the battlefield. As another refresher, on September 17, 1862, Generals Robert E. Lee and George McClellan faced off near Antietam Creek in Sharpsburg, Maryland, in the first battle of the Civil War to be fought on northern soil. The result was 23,000 soldiers killed, wounded or missing after twelve hours of savage combat. The battle ended in what historians consider an inconclusive “draw”, but the Confederate Army was forced back and this tactical victory led to Abraham Lincoln feeling secure enough to issue his Emancipation Proclamation. Following our ride around Antietam, we bike into historic Sharpsburg and then cross over the Potomac River into West Virginia and beautiful Shepherdstown.

We spend our next two nights as guests at the handsome Bavarian Inn where we can enjoy their eleven acres of manicured grounds, the infinity pool, and rooms that all feature balconies overlooking the Potomac.
Accommodation: Bavarian Inn
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Biking: 29-32 or 37 miles (46-51 or 60 kilometres)
Terrain: Intermediate

Today features a ride along the Potomac River. Heading south on the scenic C & O towpath we then cross the river on a long former railroad bridge that leads over to Harpers Ferry. This small town is located at the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers, and its strategic location has resulted in it having quite a tumultuous history. The town is mostly famous for John Brown’s raid. John Brown was a radical abolitionist who on October 16, 1859 led a group of 21 men in a raid on the town’s arsenal. His plan was to instigate a major slave rebellion in the South. It didn’t end up so well for John or his men (he was actually captured by General Robert E. Lee who at that time was still in the Union Army) but it did succeed to deepen the divide between the North and South. Lesser known is that in 1862 Lee returned to Harpers Ferry (as a Confederate General) on his way to Antietam and ordered Stonewall Jackson to attack the town (which he did with success), and that a few days later most of Lee’s retreating army passed right through the town on its way back south. Visiting Harper’s Ferry now is like stepping into the past. The town is well protected as a National Historical Site, and as you stroll the picturesque (and hilly!) streets, visit exhibits, authentic period buildings, museums, restaurants, boutiques, book stores, homes, and churches you will see that the National Park Service has done a wonderful job of restoring the town to look and feel like it was in the 1800s.

We return back along the C & O Canal and also have a pretty 15-mile optional ride. This is also a chance to linger in Shepherdstown and enjoy its many historical buildings and the many shops, galleries and cafes that make this small college town such a fun place to visit.
Accommodation: Bavarian Inn
Meals: Breakfast, Dinner

Biking: 24, 29 or 39 miles (39, 46 or 63 kilometres)
Terrain: Easier to Intermediate

Today, start your ride at White’s Ferry, where you can see the still operational “Jubal Early,” a ferry boat that is much like the ones that have been used here since 1817. Your ride today is along the C&O towpath, a cyclist’s delight. The path is flat (actually a tad bit downhill) and scenic with beautiful trees and marshes, great views over the river, and assorted wildlife – like deer, fox, turtles, great blue heron and, at times, even some bald eagles. This is all enjoyed with riding that is so easy you may find you don’t switch gears the whole way. Again, a bit of history as to why this most perfect tree-lined bike path even exists. As early as 1754, George Washington envisioned a system of river and canal navigation along the Potomac River, so that merchants in eastern cities could tap into the western region’s resources and markets. Various schemes were suggested and tested over the early years, but ultimately it was decided to construct a separate channel or canal, paralleling the river for its entire 184.5 miles from Washington, DC, to Cumberland, Maryland. You see on your ride hundreds of original features of this canal system including locks, lock houses, aqueducts, and other canal structures. Railroads ultimately spelled the demise of the canal and towpaths, but we are the happy unintended twenty-first century beneficiaries of this huge project. Our section of the towpath includes some interesting sights, such as Swain’s Lock, the huge Seneca Aqueduct, and the Great Falls Visitor Center (former tavern) which contains a small, but well-conceived museum that explains the history, engineering features, and daily life of the canal and the people who worked on it. Take time to walk out the Olmsted Island Trail to the spectacular overlook high above the massive Great Falls.

End the day at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, DC.
Accommodation: Watergate Hotel
Meals: Breakfast, Dinner

Biking: 32 or 33 miles (51 or 53 kilometres)
Terrain: Easier

To top off the tour, you are treated to a professionally guided bike tour of Washington D.C. sites. Your guides entertain you with poignant, fascinating, and incredible stories about presidents, Congress, memorials, parks, spies, and scandals as you visit many of the iconic sites of our nation’s capital. Shuttle or bike back to the Watergate Hotel to pick up your car or take a short taxi ride to Ronald Reagan National Airport.
Accommodation: Not applicable
Meals: Breakfast

Biking: 18 miles (29 kilometres)
Terrain: Easier